Juno Temple Was 'Devastated' When Tim Burton Didn't Want Her forAlice in Wonderland: 'A Dream Role For Me'

Mar. 15, 2025

Juno Templeis reflecting on being turned down for the role of Alice in 2010’sAlice in Wonderland, and how she realized she ultimately “wasn’t right” for the part.

While speaking withMiles TellerforInterview,theVenom: The Last Danceactress, 35, revealed that playing the titular Alice was a “dream role” for her.

“I think quite early on in a career, you have to be able to understand why the ‘no’ is happening,” she said. “Of course, you can’t help but take it personally sometimes. I was 17 whenTim BurtonmadeAlice in Wonderland. I have a first-edition copy ofAlice in Wonderlandthat I actually sleep with on my bedside table like it’s the Bible.”

While Temple wanted to portray Alice “so badly” at the time, things didn’t work out the way she hoped. The role ended up going toMia Wasikowska, and Temple wasn’t able to land an audition with Burton, now 66.

Juno Temple attends the 2024 Vanity Fair Oscar Party.Taylor Hill/Getty

Taylor Hill/Getty

“I remember my agent called, and the first thing he said was, ‘Are you sitting down? We just wanted to tell you that Tim Burton doesn’t think you are right for Alice, so there’s actually not going to be an audition for it,’ " Temple recalled. “I was devastated.”

“I watched the movie. And this was a really important realization for me at 17 years old — I wasn’t right for Alice,” she added. “I’m the Queen of Hearts. When you see a final product, it always makes sense as to why you were not the fit for that role at that moment in time. I auditioned for a few of those Disney remakes. And it’s like, I’m not Cinderella.”

The actress, who eventually took on the role of Thistlewit in Disney’s 2014 filmMaleficent, told Teller that when she reads for a new role, she occasionally recommends a different actor if she doesn’t feel she’s a good fit.

“I think, ‘Maybe I’m not right for this, but you know who is? I have a really great person that you should meet.’ People have always said that being competitive in this industry is important. And to a degree, it is. But I also think it’s really important to be supportive,” she said.

“Actors, we’re a bunch of unusual people and we have unusual things that turn us on and turn us off. And I respect that on a huge level. Because like you said, film is forever. You don’t want to pretend.”

Juno Temple and Chiwetel Ejiofor in “Venom: The Last Dance”.Laura Radford

Laura Radford

Speaking on other roles she wanted to try for, Temple also shared that, at one point during the production of 2014’sBirdman, there was a “conflict” withEmma Stone’s schedule. So she read the script and intended to audition — but that too didn’t work out as she planned, she told Teller: “I was on my way to the audition, and then my agents called me and were like, ‘They figured out the schedule.’ " (Stone earned a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nomination for the film.)

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The actress opened up about how she paid close attention to her character’s backstory when embarking on her latest project, in a conversation withPEOPLE last month.

Juno Temple on Sept. 15, 2024.Getty Images

Getty Images

“Anytime you get to inhabit somebody else, you really want to think about what is happening in this moment in time when you’re meeting them, what is affecting them, and how they’re affecting the people around them,” she said. “But I also think it is very much about reacting with the people that you are working with and I got really lucky with my costars.”

Temple added that she “learned a lot” and “also had a lot of fun” while working on the latestVenomfilm, in theaters now.

“We got to have some really amazing scenes that I was really grateful for,” Temple said.

source: people.com